The Pass by Zion Kistler (books to read romance TXT) 📖

about me. You’re better than me, and I’m gonna have ta’ fight these insane devils,” He said, but Mildo replied, “Yeah, but ya’ can use magic. I can’t.” I guess that’s true, Treaf thought. But he was still going to be completely smothered. Even Malock was not this impressive. And if I die than this whole war will be for nothing? That sounded like too much, but he smiled and thought, yeah, that won’t happen. They’re gonna go easy on me, I know it.
Thankfully, though, the previous competitors were resting and drinking water, and Treaf had severe doubt that they would pick him out of the group next. But he had to remind himself that there were only about twenty-five of them.
The magic that they were using seemed impossible, Treaf decided. As far as I am concerned it takes a lot of time to make something that powerful happen. Of course they had premade the Spirits, but still…Yes, he agreed that if they joined their group and fought they would most likely win all of the battles, for they had been losing them quite a lot recently. But of course, as with the Rangers, Treaf guessed that most of them would have to stay in the city to protect it. But the cool thing is that only a few of them would suffice for a whole town, no matter how big, he decided, grinning.
He then watched as Noedar and the other guy walked off into the crowd a ways, but the other guy got on a raised mound in the middle of the crowd and said: “We will now be holding another round. Does anyone want to volunteer right away, or……?” He left this place for emphasis, and the people around that area grew dead silent. Treaf chuckled to himself. No one was going to do it.
“In that case I will have to choose someone from you.” He stopped and looked around at all of them, and since Treaf was not in the very front he decided that the leader could probably not even see him. But with horror he watched on as the man stopped at him and kept gazing for several seconds. Treaf’s heart was beating faster than when he had confronted the Alkeron.
“Hmmmmmmm…how about you?” He said seriously. Treaf gulped and headed towards the pen, trying not to look nervous in the least, though he was very nervous in reality. Okay. I have the chance to prove that I am as good as any one of these guys. This shouldn’t be too hard…that Noedar guy was especially good. And I’ll bet that they’ll go easy on me…it angered him that he was being treated like a ‘lesser’ but even so he took the challenge full on.
His challenge, who did not have quite big of a sword, strode towards the other side of the pen, taking his time. He had a single-edged blade with no giant saw on the back of it. Instead it was curved at the top going upwards, and the length must have been about four feet. Haha…I bet my swords gonna break right away…then I’ll have to use magic.
In less than a minute the kid reached the other side, and Treaf prepared himself for the first move to make. He hoped to end it quickly without much physical exhaustion, and so he planned to use the spell ‘Gurvisorm Radjak Poshaden.’ He had used it once before. He smiled wryly.
All of them anticipated the time when Malock would yell ‘fight,’ and Treaf just wished he hurry up and say it since he was already so nervous. But not anymore.
“FIGHT!” He yelled, and Treaf immediately made the necessary hand sign and barked “GURVISORM RADJAK POSHADEN!” Immediately an invisible energy rushed from his compressed hands, and his opponent grasped the air for a second, flailed, and slowly grabbed his neck in pain. He gurgled, and ever so slowly he began rising into the air, grabbing and clawing at his neck the whole time.
Damn it! I can’t lose concentration…Treaf thought as he gritted his teeth. In about ten seconds the man would be knocked out.
But then slowly the current of energy coming from Treaf’s hands began to fade slightly, and at that moment the man yelled with what little energy he had left, “Poshaden!” and the current was ripped from his wrist. In shock Treaf stumbled back, but immediately regained his footing. I see. So the spell ‘Poshaden’ is a summoning spell and a shield. I need to learn a bit more. I don’t even know the structure and purposes of most spells…with that, seeing that the other guy was weak, Treaf drew his sword quickly and rushed over to him, sprinting as fast as he could.
He reached him in a matter of seconds, and when he did, he swung his sword heavily at the man’s chest, which sent a whooshing sound through the air. The guy barely blocked it, and, seeing the opportunity through his hair, Treaf mustered all the strength that he had and lunged, throwing back his chest in case he also lunged, like what happened with Mildo.
But the man drew a dagger like what Treaf had seen others do quite a bit and blocked Treaf’s relatively small sword with that. But no matter, Treaf leapt over him, kicked him in the back with his boot, and then stomped on his head when he fell, holding his sword on the side of his thy. And with that he thrust his sword at his neck, and grinned wildly, and evilly.
“Hey hey….. I WON!” Treaf yelled, and raised his arms. There were no cheers as he had expected. Sighing, he strode off of the pen and wiped his face where sweat had accumulated. That was so much easier than I had damn well expected, he thought, sheathing his sword.
When he reached Mildo he looked astonished, but chose not to say anything, and Treaf went off to the sidelines to grab some water. He had not done much in that battle, but he had been standing in the sun for about a half hour, and so he took some anyway. While the cool liquid ran down his throat, he thought, it was pretty brilliant of me to use that spell! Otherwise I would never have won…he watched as his opponent walked off the training arena. I only left him with a few bruises though. That Noedar guy pretty much killed the leader. Thinking of this incident he realized that both Noedar and the leader had had wards on them, and that was why they had not gotten hurt very easy. Hey hey I need to do that he decided, and watched as the new pair walked off.

Hours later they had finished the ‘training,’ which had only consisted of fighting each other. Treaf realized that in all the training that he had ever been in it was always only fighting, never really learning much. He did not really mind this, but he wanted to learn more about magic. After all, as he had just learned, it was easy to defeat someone without much knowledge of magic. Of course he was not considering the fact of what it be like when he had to fight someone who did know much about magic, but he decided not to mention that part until he knew more.
Surprisingly, even though it was about five in the evening, it was already completely dark, and Treaf, with all the others, had to feel their way back to he town. The guards had promised to bring lanterns or torches, but for some strange reason they had not been back for ten minutes or more.
It was also very cold in that part of the land. The Jaragon was a very mountainous region, yes, but since they were right in heart of it, or on top of them, it seemed colder than Treaf was used to. That plus the fact that it was late fall, it made the nights quite freezing. And I really hope that our sleeping courters will be heated, he thought, grimacing.
Then as he was walking he smacked his nose against something and fell over, and then realized that what he had hit was wooden. Immediately he thought of the gate that lead into the city, and so he got up and winced. The gates were not open.
Treaf then shouted loudly at the guards, if there were any, (he hoped so,) and there was no reply. “Damn it!” he yelled, and then looked through the crack in the gates. There was still a little light.
Mildo came alongside of him. “They had better open them up,” he said, clenching his fist from the cold, and then blowing on it. Treaf luckily had leather padded gloves and gauntlets on, so that part of him was not cold. But his boots, thick as they were, were stiff and his toes were frozen up in them. I guess we’ll just wait for a little, he decided, but soon he was impatient and looked through the crack again. The city was completely lit by the many houses, and the smooth streets reflected the lights and windows. And through one of the windows Treaf saw someone having a very large feast.
After abut fifteen minutes Treaf couldn’t stand it anymore and yelled, “Damnit I want some food!” and he stamped his foot against the ground. Mildo looked just as exasperated.
Finally the guards arrived with torches and lanterns, and they dropped them down to Treaf and Mildo, who were the closest to them.
“Now will ya’ please unlock the gates?” Treaf said a little sarcastically. As the guards began un-bolting it Treaf thought, for such an organized place it seems really strange that they would forget about un-locking the gates and leaving us trapped out here. He sighed as the cold air leaked into him and subdued him.
Then there was the usual creaking and groaning of large gates, and they opened as they always did. Thankfully Treaf strode into the city, for he was starving, and he could barely stop himself from running to the guest house.
In what seemed like moments they all arrived, and Treaf thrust the door to the place open.
“Hey hey, I smell food,” he said, and sniffed the air around him. It was warm in the place, and he thought he smelled onion soup or something.
After he had strode over to a table, however, he realized that it was in fact stew, with some kind of unknown bread which anyway looked very delicious.
He sat down heavily and discarded his cloak, which made it too warm to where since it was